An Iranian watching El Salvador walk back its Bitcoin law
I live in El Salvador. In 2021 it became the first country to make bitcoin legal tender, and every business was told it had to accept it. In January 2025, as a condition of a $1.4B IMF loan, that became voluntary. Taxes are paid in dollars again, and this year the government wallet, Chivo, was mostly handed to a private operator.
People back home in Iran ask me if that means "Bitcoin failed here." I tell them the opposite lesson. The adoption that stuck never came from a decree. It started in 2019 in a surf village, El Zonte, with a donor whose only condition was "don't convert it to dollars." People chose it.
That matters for Iranians, because we will never get a friendly law. What we can get is people who hold their own keys, know how to back them up, and teach a neighbor. No government signature can take that away, in San Salvador or in Tehran.
Question for Nostr: what grassroots Bitcoin education actually worked where you live, without government help? Meetups, local merchants, circular economies, school programs? I'm collecting ideas for Farsi speakers.
#bitcoin #elsalvador #iran
zamanibitcoin / زمانی در بیتکوین | Zamani in Bitcoin
npub164…slcny
2026-10-23 06:42:38 UTC
Author Public Key
npub164j6wfwg88m8kha2ksw6xzdjq63zyma8ngnuyl9mqh2za9u2dldqlslcnyPublished at
2026-10-23 06:42:38 UTCEvent JSON
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"content": "An Iranian watching El Salvador walk back its Bitcoin law\n\nI live in El Salvador. In 2021 it became the first country to make bitcoin legal tender, and every business was told it had to accept it. In January 2025, as a condition of a $1.4B IMF loan, that became voluntary. Taxes are paid in dollars again, and this year the government wallet, Chivo, was mostly handed to a private operator.\n\nPeople back home in Iran ask me if that means \"Bitcoin failed here.\" I tell them the opposite lesson. The adoption that stuck never came from a decree. It started in 2019 in a surf village, El Zonte, with a donor whose only condition was \"don't convert it to dollars.\" People chose it.\n\nThat matters for Iranians, because we will never get a friendly law. What we can get is people who hold their own keys, know how to back them up, and teach a neighbor. No government signature can take that away, in San Salvador or in Tehran.\n\nQuestion for Nostr: what grassroots Bitcoin education actually worked where you live, without government help? Meetups, local merchants, circular economies, school programs? I'm collecting ideas for Farsi speakers.\n\n#bitcoin #elsalvador #iran",
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